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Goin' Deep: The 40th Birthday Challenge.
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Joined: Nov 2009
Posts: 582
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OP
Joined: Nov 2009
Posts: 582 |
The cold shocked me into a weary awareness of the trees and trail in front of me as I stumbled up the bridge to cross the Lyell fork just after midnight. There was an eerie calm to the forest as I walked, arms hugged tightly to my chest, my legs pumping in an almost frantic effort to get warm and stay that way. I hummed along with my headphones, more as a subtle warning to any critters to stay away and let me wander south, winding my way along the well-worn path. Strangely, after the first hour I was wide awake, focused ahead, catching the occasional sparkle of the moon on the granite and splashing through the minor tributaries feeding the river. The moonlight spread long shadows across the meadow, and I slowed only to feel the caress of fog against my face and legs, smiled as I was wrapped in the humid blanket for a moment. I only got turned around once, where the trail crosses the river, thinking that I remembered heading further along in an attempt to climb Mt. Lyell a few years ago. I tried not to shine my lamp in the direction of the tents, to wake my fellow travelers in the wee hours of morning, where the only noise was the water flowing across the rocks. The trail climbed gently from there, granite steps arcing over a ridge and descending to a black lake away, then climbing again to the broad pass ahead. The moon had set, replaced by the gentle grey of the coming dawn, and I stepped on a patch of firm, slick snow to “finish” the climb. I still had time, though, as I looked to the skies and saw the barest hint of color brushed high above the crest. It had been too dark still to cut early across the easy slabs and meadows below Donahue Pass, but running the ridgeline was an easy task in the growing light. I grimaced a bit at the drop to the tarn below the western ridge of Donahue Peak, but welcomed a cold drink after dipping my bottle. The rosy warmth was gently descending to the darkened outlines of rock; the waters of the tarn, and the snowfields below the mountains, reflected the gathering strength of dawn. Part way up the ridgeline, I turned to sit quietly on a boulder, my breath calming after a minute. I could feel the sweat on my neck and shoulders. Even the birds and marmots, chattering a moment before, fell silent. Together, we watched the tips of the range burst into flame as the sun rose triumphant into a crystalline sky. More here. From the luckiest girl in the world: Climb Hard. Be Safe. -L
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Re: Goin' Deep: The 40th Birthday Challenge.
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Joined: Aug 2011
Posts: 464 Likes: 1
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Joined: Aug 2011
Posts: 464 Likes: 1 |
Great! I hope you don't mind I posted it on my FB page as a example of a hiker's motivation. Thanks
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Re: Goin' Deep: The 40th Birthday Challenge.
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Joined: Nov 2009
Posts: 1,037 Likes: 6
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Joined: Nov 2009
Posts: 1,037 Likes: 6 |
Laura
Thanks for your beautiful writing. I enjoyed and appreciated it.
This deserves not one but several quotes from the mountaineering literature. I tried to choose from your work vs play theme and the 'black balloon' birthday theme. The last one is rather sad, but don't let it happen. Keep going. Harvey
As obvious as it seems, it took me a long while to realize that what had happened to us was more important than what happened to the mountain. David Roberts, Deborah page 8
So is mountaineering altogether a private affair between the man and his mountain. HW Tilman, Everest 1938 page 435
I was a surgeon. The powerful aura of Mount Everest had been absorbed into my subconscious and I considered the summit unobtainable for me…surgery was what I did, not what I was. Gradually I felt the need for a long pause from what I did to see what I was and whether there was any difference between the two. Kenneth Kamler, Doctor on Everest, page 23
Courage is doing only what you are scared of doing… it takes more endurance to work in a city than it does to climb a mountain. Peter Boardman, The Shining Mountain page 12
But no journalist wrote about the banality of city life or how easy it is to become another automaton paying bills and working nine to five and being so removed from the primary necessities of life and so far from real fear and natural beauty and human instinct that when death finally approaches in some antiseptic white room, just as you have been waiting for it, you sense that you have already been dead for years. Jonathan Waterman, In The Shadow of Denali page 246
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Re: Goin' Deep: The 40th Birthday Challenge.
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Joined: Sep 2009
Posts: 1,261
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Joined: Sep 2009
Posts: 1,261 |
But no journalist wrote about the banality of city life or how easy it is to become another automaton paying bills and working nine to five and being so removed from the primary necessities of life and so far from real fear and natural beauty and human instinct that when death finally approaches in some antiseptic white room, just as you have been waiting for it, you sense that you have already been dead for years. Jonathan Waterman, In The Shadow of Denali page 246
I never liked this sad quote, as it demonstrates a person who has lost the ability to revel in the less dramatic of nature's experiences. I still become delighted by the sight of a double rainbow from my backyard -- in the city -- or the sounds of two hawks circling high, high overhead. I strain to see them, but I can hear them. Cloud formations are still visible and recorded on the cheapest of used cameras. Sigh. I guess that I am easy to please. One would guess that perhaps I have not experienced the real deal, however, I found the Dolomites to bee quite impressive, too.
The body betrays and the weather conspires, hopefully, not on the same day.
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Re: Goin' Deep: The 40th Birthday Challenge.
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Joined: Nov 2009
Posts: 1,037 Likes: 6
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Joined: Nov 2009
Posts: 1,037 Likes: 6 |
Sorry, Bee, I tried to warn it was an odd quote - a warning to others or perhaps a downer - but something Laura won't let happen.
Laura, your writing is so uplifting. Let me try again with a more positive tone. I apologize if it seems like I am high-jacking your thread, but instead, my intention is to compliment your writing as being alongside the Masters:
We settled down on a comfortable bed of sand, and watched the approach of night transform the wild desert mountains into phantoms of unreality. I lay watching the constellations swing across the sky. Did I sleep that night - or was I caught up for a moment into the ceaseless rhythm of space? Eric Shipton, Blank On The Map page 223
The are few treasures of more lasting worth than the experiences of a way of life that is in itself wholly satisfying. Such, after all, are the only possessions of which no fate, no cosmic catastrophe can deprive us; nothing can alter the fact if for one moment in eternity we have really lived. Eric Shipton, Upon That Mountain page 454
I knew then that our earth is really one big animal with me hanging on as a mere microcosmic flea. I could see it, I could almost feel it…I wanted to shout it…but I was alone…so I gave myself to this new vision of the organism who lived and breathed and even tolerated us clambering on its back…I had found a happiness beyond all time and ambition and breathing. Jonathan Waterman, In The Shadow of Denali page 42
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Re: Goin' Deep: The 40th Birthday Challenge.
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Joined: Sep 2009
Posts: 1,261
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Joined: Sep 2009
Posts: 1,261 |
Ah, yes -- much better! (Who hasn't stayed awake on a mountain night admiring the sky....)
The body betrays and the weather conspires, hopefully, not on the same day.
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